Typically, electric drive devices for driving motor vehicles are installed on the front and/or rear axle(s) of the vehicle with the axis of rotation of the drive assembly and crosswise to the direction of travel. A motor vehicle is understood to be, in particular, a passenger vehicle or a commercial vehicle. This arrangement leads to a high packing space requirement, whereby a distribution of power and/or torque is limited, in particular, since a necessary additional structural or packing space is not available for a suitable transmission. The packing space available can in fact be increased by the use of axles with struts or shocks, but disadvantages result, such as, for example, a reduced loading width in the packing space, difficulties in realizing a convertible or station wagon version of the motor vehicle, as well as increased manufacturing costs. Overall, the implementation of dual drives on one axle, for example, for realizing a torque distribution (torque vectoring), in the case of this arrangement of the axle drives is difficult or—particularly for smaller vehicle classes—possible only with obvious power losses.
For example, the publication DE 44 34 237 A1 is known from the prior art. This relates to a vehicle axle with electric single-wheel drives, with which overstressing shall be prevented over longer periods of time in the case of unequal loading of the drive wheels of the vehicle axle of one of the single-wheel drives. Further, an over-dimensioning of the single-wheel drive shall be avoided. It is proposed for this to provide a clutch, by way of which single-wheel drives can be joined together in a force fit. The clutch can be actuated by a control, so that it engages automatically and joins together the two single-wheel drives in a force fit, as long as there is no falling below a predeterminable steering angle of the vehicle, and/or a different loading of the single-wheel drives is present.
In addition, the publication DE 10 2010 010 438 A1 shows a chassis for a motor vehicle, having an electric axle, which has two electric machines, wherein in the region of each end of the electric axle, a wheel is rotatably mounted, and each wheel can be driven by means of this associated electric machine, as well as with a reduction gear arranged between the respective electric machine and the wheel associated therewith. It is provided thereby that the respective reduction gear is linked by way of a linking shaft to the wheel associated with this reduction gear, and the respective axes of rotation of the two electric machines are arranged parallel next to one another.
In addition, the publication DE 11 2012 001 601 T5 describes a rear-wheel drive device, the publication DE 10 2010 017 966 A1 describes a vehicle with electric drive, the publication DE 10 2015 103 906 A1 describes an electric drive train, and the publication DE 10 2010 020 576 A1 describes an electric drive system for a motor vehicle.